The First Purge is an incredible fourth entry in five years in the micro-budget horror series. Here are some notes on’t, prepared for Dublin City FM’s Sunday Breakfast with Patrick Doyle early this morning.

The Purge series has expanded dramatically in scope since the claustrophobia of 2013’s house under siege original with Ethan Hawke and Lena Headey trying to survive the night of annual temporarily legalised criminality. Arguably though as the series’ scope has become bigger it has become less unsettling; the government snuffing out a troublesome underclass isn’t as unnerving as your envious neighbours smiling as they come to dispatch you. If Rio Bravo/Assault on Precinct 13 was the model for that then writer/director James DeMonaco was explicit in locating the sequels in Escape from New York territory. The First Purge features a hero shot to beat all hero shots as Y’lan Noel’s Dmitri decides to finally sort out this situation and stomps towards the tower block, wearing his Bruce Willis white vest, with a big gun over his shoulder, a trashcan on fire to his right, and the block shrouded in smoke from the mayhem across Staten Island. In some respects this film is Attack the Block with a more likeable lead and no jokes or aliens.

I didn’t get to chat about all of these points, but we did cover most of them. Tune into 103.2 FM to hear Patrick Doyle’s breakfast show every Sunday on Dublin City FM, and catch up with his excellent Classical Choice programme on Mixcloud now.